»Dark Patterns«: This is how you are manipulated on the Internet

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Young woman shopping online: every click is recorded precisely

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Francesco Carta / Getty Images

There are clicks on the net that are tough: for example, those with which a contract can be concluded in a matter of minutes - while an extensive study of the small print and a call to a barely reachable hotline are necessary to cancel. Other clicks, on the other hand, are of little use: no matter how often you reject the paid premium account on a streaming platform - you have to keep clicking on "No". And then there are still clicks that can drive you crazy: for example those with which you want to contradict all advertising cookies, but which sooner or later force you to give up because almost every cookie banner puts new obstacles in the way.

The tricks behind all of these clicks have a name: Dark Patterns.

They are now common practice for many companies.

Now politicians at the state, federal and European level want to put a stop to the hustle and bustle.

Even in the US there is a new front against dubious business practices.

On Thursday the Bundestag passed the law for fair consumer contracts.

The law is significantly leaner than what Justice and Consumer Protection Minister Christine Lambrecht intended.

In the future, contracts by telephone will have to be recorded in writing, but the planned ban on two-year contracts with cell phone providers and fitness studios has been evaporated.

Consumer cockroach trap

At the request of the Greens, however, another point has been added: in the future, companies must enable consumers to terminate long-term contracts just as easily as they do to conclude a contract.

If a contract has been concluded with a button on the Internet, the providers must in future also offer a termination button that is just as easily accessible.

So far, many providers have made it as difficult as possible to cancel.

"Contracts with recurring services, such as subscriptions or memberships, can be concluded quickly online with one click, but then sometimes have to be terminated in nooks and crannies," explains Bundestag member Volker Ullrich (CSU) to SPIEGEL.

Financial services are excluded from the new regulation - to the annoyance of the Greens.

"Why shouldn't it be possible, for example, to cancel travel insurance with a cancellation button?" Asks Tabea Rößner, who initiated the cancellation button with her parliamentary group.

An expert opinion commissioned by the Greens had shown deficiencies in the insurance sector: Those who conclude an insurance contract can often only terminate it with problems.

In one case examined, it took 17 clicks to get to the termination option.

This method has a name: "Roach Motel" - cockroach trap.

The animal or the internet user finds their way in, but no longer out.

Successful strategy

For several years now, consumer advocates, network activists and researchers have been collecting design tricks that are supposed to get users to spend more money or to make their data available. "Dark patterns have been widespread for a long time, especially in e-commerce," explains Professor Dominik Herrmann, who researches privacy protection at the University of Bamberg. An early trick, for example, was to not show the customer shipping costs or other special items until the very end of the ordering process, if they no longer wanted to repeat the entire ordering process with another provider.

The method proved successful, and web shop operators were constantly finding new ways to manipulate their customers.

For example, users are used to clicking away certain Windows dialogs unread - so many providers designed their platforms in such a way that users just as reflexively click away the information that is unfavorable for them.

The methods are now spreading from websites and apps to other media.

Private broadcasters now also display cookie banners on smart TVs in order to be able to record the viewing behavior of their viewers individually.

The release of your own data is done by pressing the remote control.

However, if you want to object, you have to read the cookie dialogs carefully.

"Customers only turn away angrily when you overdo it," Herrmann told SPIEGEL.

In some cases, the developers no longer even knew that they were manipulating consumers, but merely copied the methods that had already proven to be successful with other offers.

These are continuously refined with so-called A / B tests.

Different customers are shown different variants of the same dialog.

The one with the best results stays online.

Blacklist with huge loopholes

So far the legislature has only acted selectively. The black list of the law against unfair competition prohibits, for example, putting consumers under time pressure with false information so that they do not have the opportunity to make an actually informed decision. However, the method is only forbidden if the information is incorrect. If, on the other hand, the time pressure is real, the providers largely have a free hand. Amazon can also celebrate its “Prime Day” in Germany, on which a noticeable countdown can be seen alongside thousands of offers.

But the arc is now not only overstretched for many consumers, the increasing spread of design tricks is also causing displeasure in politics.

At the beginning of May, for example, the federal states' consumer protection ministers demanded sweeping regulations against the »almost widespread use of these manipulative design patterns«.

Members of the European Parliament are also pushing for fundamental new regulations.

Green MP Alexandra Geese is working to incorporate a ban on such design practices into the Digital Services Act.

Geese is constantly experiencing for herself how much tricks have found their way into everyday digital life, because she tries to consistently reject advertising cookies.

"It's not really possible for normal people," Geese explains in an interview with SPIEGEL.

But the parliamentary deliberations show that it is not so easy to put the multitude of different tactics under one law. Should it already be banned as a dark pattern if the rejection of a cookie costs one mouse click more, or should the limit be drawn with three mouse clicks? Or are such small-scale rules the completely wrong way to go? In any case, it is important to find an overarching European solution: "Large players in particular otherwise benefit from the uncertainty," says the MEP.

Geese has a big player in its sights: She accuses Facebook of specifically promoting controversial and destructive content because users interact more with such content, which in turn increases the income of the social media group.

"It's a deliberate manipulation of people," says Geese.

But can companies be forbidden from optimizing their platforms for content that is requested particularly often by users?

Such questions will be debated extensively in the coming year.

A final law is not expected until 2022 at the earliest.

An app against psychological tricks?

Professor Mario Martini from the German University of Administrative Sciences in Speyer is now investigating such questions.

Together with colleagues, the administrative lawyer is researching nature in the Dark Patterns Detection Project.

On behalf of the Federal Ministry of Justice and Consumer Protection, an app is to be created in the project that automatically recognizes dark patterns and can warn consumers of targeted manipulation.

But a review of the current situation has shown that this task is more difficult than expected.

With his colleagues, Martini has now identified 20 different dark patterns.

The researchers keep coming across new methods: "Nobody can claim to know all the dark patterns," Martini told SPIEGEL.

The list ranges from the "Roach Motel" to camouflaged ads.

Some of the patterns are comparatively simple: For example, with »nagging« the question is repeatedly asked whether customers want to book a chargeable additional service.

Some websites confuse users by asking questions that are misleading or even deliberately swapping buttons.

Still other tricks use findings from behavioral psychology.

Providers like to incorporate comments from allegedly enthusiastic customers on offer websites in order to build up social pressure.

If you look for the images on the Internet, many of the supposed customers turn out to be models from image databases.

"Dark patterns play on subconscious behavior patterns that are inherent in every human being," explains Martini. Certain groups such as children or seniors inexperienced on the Internet are particularly susceptible to the design tricks. But even users who are tried and tested online and legally educated cannot fully defend themselves against the unconscious effects. "I would be lying if I said I could completely free myself from their influence," says Martini.

In the USA, too, resistance to everyday manipulation is increasing. As early as 2019, MPs from Democrats and Republicans jointly tabled a bill that would not only prohibit the use of manipulation techniques, but would also restrict A / B tests. But the law got stuck in the parliamentary committees. In order to build up political pressure, the consumer advocates of "Consumer Reports" have set up a website on which IT heavyweights such as Amazon, but also more traditional companies such as "Scientific American" or the "New York Times" are denounced for their use of dark patterns . German consumer advocates are now also calling for dark patterns to be reported.